Indians

Native Americans in the Missouri Valley Region

We are in the process of creating content for the Native American Web pages. In the meantime, explore the Native American and Western Photograph Collection in the Digital Gallery. You may also want to read the accompanying essay written for this collection.

The Index is particularly helpful in finding specific names and topics. Volumes 1-21 (1921-1942) of the quarterly journal of the Oklahoma Historical Society are online and searchable. Volumes 22-40 (1944-1962) are searchable but are in pdf format. Volumes 41-80 (1963-2002) have only the Table of Contents. The Missouri Valley Room has the journals from volume 1-60 (1921-1960).

Essay

Photographing Native Americans in Oklahoma-Indian Territory by Jeremy Drouin, a Missouri Valley Special Collections librarian The American West, and in particular the Native American peoples that inhabited western lands, were a source of fascination for Euro-Americans in the nineteenth century. As the nation expanded westward guided by the doctrine of "manifest destiny," authors, artists, and photographers followed and documented the settlement of the western frontier. Read more...